This publication has its origins in a series of conversations about economics between Partners and Community Action Network. Our collective experience was that while community development and community education helped people to become politically, socially and culturally aware and active, engagement with the subject of economics seemed to leave people feeling mystified and powerless.

We initiated a cooperative inquiry called Reclaiming Economics with the aim of creating processes and resources which would enable individuals, groups and communities to explore their own experience of, reflect on and creatively engage with the economic realities which are central to their own lives.

This publication results from this inquiry and is both a report and a resource. It is an account of what happened during the inquiry, the background thinking and the processes, exercises and resources designed for and during the inquiry.